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A Style to Love: Liberty Prints

My name is Susie Lau aka Susie Bubble and I’m a Liberty-a-holic. Or as a more serious and formal introduction, I’m Susie Lau or Bubble (whichever you prefer), from London in United Kingdom, writer of the blog Style Bubble.

On my blog I output my thoughts, observations and experiences in fashion and style and have been doing so for a grand total of 5 years (making me prehistoric in fashion blogging terms).

Back to being a Liberty-a-holic though, I’m specifically referring to Liberty print, a floral print that I consider not something that necessarily needs to be ‘bang on trend’ to be relevant. Florals may be going all enlarged, maximal and photographic for the new S/S 11 season but I’ll still be clutching onto my Liberty printed duds and maintain that this floral can co-exist with their bigger and shinier counterparts.

It’s precisely the slightly old-fashioned quality of these floral patterns that make them such a sturdy staple. The fact that a lot of Liberty floral prints get described as being ‘ditzy’ pertains to its girly and endearingly naive nature.

This also means that these qualities can be manipulated into a different context as seen at Maison Martin Margiela’s latest Artisanal collection, which was inspired by flowers in general and sought to flip our perceptions. Two of the looks were made up of Liberty print fabrics made into appliqu?� flowers or woven into a degrade weave. It took a mind-boggling 117 hours to make these two silhouettes.

A more straightforward and accessible recent Liberty print riff can be seen in these Versus dresses. Christopher Kane, who designs the Versus line has never been one to shy away from being overly literal with his themes and I love that he exploited the girlish qualities of the prints, making you wish you skipped around wearing them, aged ten, on the way to school and swinging a matching lunch box.

My personal foray into Liberty print addiction has been well documented. For instance I’m attached to an old navy blue printed shirt that is admittedly too small for me but I couldn’t dream of throwing it away. Newer additions include a special edition suitcase and paisley wedges from Swedish label Fifth Avenue Shoe Repair. In my head, all of this needs to be combined all at once to have the desired effect of Liberty print combustion.

These Cacharel pieces seen in this outfit could almost be considered vintage as they’re about ten years old. I can’t quite believe I’m owning pieces that I bought a decade ago - I’m well on my way to becoming the old eccentric lady who tells tales about her clothes to complete strangers on the street.

The most recent Liberty print invasion come courtesy of these fabric knot watches that are made by Liberty the London department store that of course is synonymous with the fabrics. I’m tempted to try and buy them all and set them to different time zones of the world just so I can wear four or five on one wrist.

Liberty have consistently taken advantage of their rich fabric resources to create exclusive items or collaborations, all of which are conveniently available on their website including these Superfuture sunglasses that will plunge me further into Liberty print addiction.

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